Town adorned with greenery and flowers

Grand prix national du fleurissement (National flowering competition)

In 2005, the national jury of Flowered Town and Villages awarded Vannes the special "Grand Prix National de Fleurissement" label for the third time in succession. It highlighted "the remarkable effort" made by the town to improve the quality of life of the people of Vannes.

For the third consecutive time, Vannes was awarded the National flowering award in 2005. This award is made every three years by a national jury. Only districts with the 4 flowers label, of which there are 12,000 out of the 36,000 districts in France, are eligible to take part in this competition.

The jury members In 2005, the jury comprised 4 members, 2 from the Ministry of Tourism and 2 directors of parks and gardens departments from other towns. The jury changes every year, and came to Vannes in August.

The assessment criteria

During the last three years, the efforts of Vannes' parks and gardens department have been particularly directed towards:

- landscaping of new parts of the eastern district (Tohannic and Beaupré Lalande) - the "1000 trees" operation, planted between 2004 and 2007 - the implementation of differentiated management of parks and grassed areas - the creation of more than 7 kilometres of extra cycle paths increasing the cycle path itinerary to 21km

Dynamic involvement of the people of VannesThe Vannetais people contribute to the flowering of their town every year by taking part in the Town's Flowered Houses competition. In 2006, 91 people from Vannes entered the competition and flowered their property, encompassing a wide variety of properties ranging from individual houses with gardens visible from the road and from public areas, to floral decoration on facades and balconies, garden spaces in front of houses and to the floral decoration of various apartment buildings, hotels, restaurants, cafés, shops, etc.

In a separate initiative, two family allotments were created in Bernus and in Kermesquel to the great satisfaction of their users. These garden spaces allow everyone a chance to produce vegetables and flowers and to maintain all the different plots of land. There are around a hundred allotments, each covering an area of 130 sq. m. Each gardener has a shed to store tools and equipment. There are several taps on each site, and rainwater butts are provided for the watering of plants. Family allotments are friendly places ideal for relaxing, meeting people, and sharing ideas.

1,000 trees operation

1,000 trees were planted in Vannes between 2005 and 2007.

Vannes, the "garden town", has held the 4 flowers label and National flowering award since 1998 (award renewed in 2002 and 2005) and pursues an environmental conservation policy. In addition to the work of the parks and gardens department whose 55 gardeners maintain 160 hectares of land, the town reaffirmed its determination to pursue its environmental improvement policy, deciding in a meeting of the council on 29 March 2004 to adopt a long-term plantation programme. The aim was to plant 1000 new trees in addition to the 4000 roadside trees already in existence in the town.

The choice of trees species took account of the different factors and constraints, notably the width of the roads, the shop fronts, the overhead and underground utilities networks, and parking requirements. The plantation programme will take place over a three-year period, and 200,000 Euros of credit has been allocated per season.